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The top three Change.org radio related petitions

As Change.org Ben Rattray founder told the Daily Show’s Jon Stewart on Monday, the web service has been around for about five years. The site lets you launch your own petition, asking a government, or a company, or some other entity to do (or stop doing) something. Here are the top three radio related Change.org causes, in order of the number of people who signed the request.

 

#1: 2Day and Fox FM sponsors: Cancel advertising until Kyle Sandilands is dumped from radio #VileKyle

According to the petition, Australian radio personality Kyle Sandilands offered this response to a journalist asking about his show ratings: “Fat slag…you’re a piece of sh*t. You haven’t got that much titty to be wearing that low cut a blouse. Watch your mouth girl, or I will hunt you down.”

The Kyle and Jackie O radio show airs weekday mornings on 2day 104.1 FM in Sydney. The protest reads:

Sandilands has a long track record of offensive comments—in 2009 a 14 year old girl revealed she had been raped while taking a lie detector test on his show, and he responded “so that’s the only experience you’ve had?”

These 2009 comments sparked advertisers Optus to pull out of their sponsorship for the Kyle and Jackie O show.

I call on you to immediately pull out of any sponsorship or advertising during Sandilands’ show (both the Kyle and Jackie O show AND the Take 40 Countdown) until he is sacked from radio.

Looks like Sandilands is still on the air. But the missive has been signed by 34,952 supporters.

#2: LM Radio: We request LM Radio to obtain a licence to broadcast in Gauteng

Gauteng is one of the nine provinces of South Africa—home to Pretoria and Johannesburg. From 1936 through 1975, LM Radio broadcast popular music to South Africa from Mozambique in Portuguese (Mozambique being a Portuguese colony until 1975). The station offered a cultural alternative to apartheid South Africa’s state run system of broadcasting (SABC).

Here’s an excerpt from LM Radio’s history page:

In the late 1950s the station underwent a major format change to cater for the younger generation who were not being catered for in South Africa by the state owned SABC. LM Radio as it was popularly known, was world renowned for its Top Twenty chart show and played a major role in promoting South African Artists and their music. LM Radio lost much of its sparkle when it was taken over by the SABC in 1972. On 7th September 1974 the station was occupied during a bloody uprising in Lourenco Marques and the administration of the station was taken over by the Frelimo army. On 12th October 1975, following Moçambican independance in June of that year, LM Radio facilities were nationalised and the station closed down bringing an era to an end. It was replaced in South Africa by Radio 5.

Now a plucky band of older LM Radio lovers want the recently revised online version put back on South Africa’s airwaves via a license. The petition reads:

We request LM Radio to obtain a licence to broadcast in Gauteng.

We have been listening on audio streaming and/ or free to air satellite and you provide programming we want and that we can get from no other radio station in Gauteng. By not broadcasting LM Radio in Gauteng and the rest of South Africa they are denying a large part of the South African population the joy of listening to their music. Most of the people older than 45 grew up with LM Radio.

The request has been signed thus far by 1,910 people.

#3: Save Voice of America Radio to Tibet

The petition calls for the preservation of Voice of America radio broadcasts to Tibet. It is directed in part to the Voice of America’s Board of Governors, and to members of House Appropriations Committee of the United States Congress.

“We adamantly object to the proposal by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages the Voice of America, and their plans to eliminate the VOA Tibetan Radio Service,” the statement begins:

This campaign against Voice of America also comes during the detention of hundreds of Tibetans into Laogai (re-education through labor camps) upon their return from India after attending teaching sessions overseen by the Dalai Lama.  It comes while Tibetan Buddhist Monks are sacrificing themselves as human torches to shock the conscience of the world as the only way to dispel darkness and ignorance. It comes during the [Peoples Republic of China’s] ongoing crackdown on Roman Catholics, Evangelical Christians, Uyghur Muslims, Falun Gong practitioners, and all prisoners of conscience in China.  It comes one week after the PRC sentenced Zhu Yufu to seven years in prison for writing a poem.

It is unclear what the VOA’s Board intends regarding its Tibetan service at this point. At its latest meeting, the Board asked that staff “form a working group to devise a holistic solution for reaching audiences throughout China, including Tibet.” The statement also suggested that the VOA’s “China distribution strategy” will require $3 million in additional revenue. The VOA’s Board of Governors includes Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

So far the petition has received 859 signatures.

There are other radio related Change.org causes that have received some support. A petition to the United Kingdom’s Ofcom broadcast/telecom regulator for a new community radio license for Dubstep House Jungle Reggae station Radio Frequency FM has received 399 votes. A petition titled “San Antonio Texas Radio Stations: Local music artists & those who have concerts here should get radio play” has gotten 69 votes. And 64 supporters have signed a petition asking the public employees union that represents workers at the Dade County, Florida school district run radio station to step down in favor of a broadcast workers union.

At the bottom end of the list, a petition calling for the Pacifica radio network to inaugurate an “Arab Spring Netizens Radio Program,” has received no votes (at least so far). A missive titled Please Go Away Nick Cannon has received one. “He is taking up valuable radio air time from music and from people who are actually funny,” the statement reads.

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